Who Kate Was
by Kiana Maria
Summary: Kate's life in Iowa leading up to her crime. She has two fathers, good and bad, and two boyfriends, good and bad.
1. Age 10

**Ames, Iowa, 1987**

Kate walked down the road with Tom by her side. But he wasn't exactly by her side; he was a few paces ahead. And a few paces ahead of him walked Jennifer and Jessica. Their hair was long and permed, and they both wore stretch pants and long sweatshirts. Jennifer wore jelly shoes and Jessica wore high tops, and their wrists were covered in plastic bracelets. They talked to Tom, and Tom talked to Kate, but they didn't talk to Kate. Everyone carried a bookbag, and wind blew the tall grass on either side of the road.

"What's a stallion?" Tom asked.

"A young boy horse," said Kate. "He's an American Saddlebred. He costs a thousand dollars."

"What costs a thousand dollars?" Jessica asked, turning around.

"My horse," Kate said, and Jennifer turned around, too. "My dad's buying him for me."

"Are you serious?" asked Jessica. "I would _kill_ to have my own horse!" They stood still, waiting for Kate to catch up.

"He's jet-black," Kate said. "I was thinking of naming him Onyx, or maybe Black Pearl. Because pearls can be black."

"You're seriously going to have your own horse?" Jessica asked.

"Yeah, seriously," said Tom.

"She's lying," Jennifer said, sneering in Kate's direction. "If _I_ can't afford to have my own horse, there's no way _she_ could."

"You can come see him!" Kate said. "I'll prove it! Come to Hutton Stables."

"If you could afford to have your own horse, you wouldn't live in _that_ house."

They had come to the end of the field, and Kate's house was visible beyond the trees. Jennifer stood with her finger pointing towards it, and Kate saw that a garbage can had been knocked over and its contents had spilled on the ground.

"Just stop being such a moron and leave her alone," said Tom.

Kate heard a noise behind her. It was a rattling that grew to a roar. She didn't want to look back, but she turned her head. And she saw her stepfather's truck ambling up the road. Its fumes polluted the air. Wayne drove past them, into the gravel driveway.

"Is _that_ your dad?" Jennifer sneered, and Jessica laughed with her as they ran up the road.

"Hey, I'll see you tomorrow," Tom said.

"Yeah," said Kate. "See ya."

She let her bookbag fall from her shoulder and carried it up the driveway. The door of Wayne's truck banged open, and he stumbled to the ground. He went in the back door and Kate climbed the steps to the front.

She went to her bedroom and put down her bookbag. Two framed pictures sat on her dresser. One was an official portrait of her dad in his uniform, and the other was the three of them together. If Jennifer and Jessica ever came to her room, they'd see that her father was the bravest soldier in the whole Army. And also that once, when she was too young to remember, her family had been happy.

She walked into the kitchen and found her mother sweeping the floor. Wayne sat at the table, with an open bottle.

"Well, how was school?" Diane asked.

"It sucked."

Wayne suddenly rose from his chair. "You watch that mouth!"

"You're not my dad!" she shouted back. "You can't tell me what to do!"

"Will you both stop!" yelled Diane.

Wayne looked at them with disgust and left the room. Diane watched him go, then continued sweeping.

"So much hair on the floor," she muttered. "I don't know if it's yours or his..."

Kate ran out the back door.

Behind the barn, she kneeled down into the sharp grass. She tried to think about her horse, and about seeing her dad that weekend, but Wayne wouldn't stay out of her head.

She hadn't noticed, but she'd been clawing at her hair, pulling strands of it out in her fingers. She walked across the grass, shoved the lid off the barbeque pit, and let it clatter to the ground. A box of matches sat on top of the grill. She flicked the hair off of her fingers, onto pieces of black charcoal. A few matches stuck out of the box, and she grabbed the box and pulled one out.

She ran the match across the side of the barbeque pit, but it didn't light. She tried again, pressing harder. A beautiful orange flame came to life, and she held the match as far away from her body as she could. Her fingers released it, and it fell on top of the loose hairs. They ignited, and she watched them burn.


	2. Age 12

**Ames, Iowa, 1989**

Kate pressed a button on Tom's boom box. She sat on his bed, and he lay next to her.

"Is it on? I don't think it's on."

Kate laughed. "It's _on_."

"Okay, uh..." Tom's face became serious. "This is Kate Austen and Tom Brennan, and this is, um, our dedication for our time capsule, here on August 15, 1989."

He picked up a toy airplane, and Kate grabbed it from his hand.

"Hey, give me that back!"

"Why are you putting this stupid plane in there?"

"Because it's cool, Katie," he said, snatching it back. "I got it when I flew to Dallas by myself."

"Ooh, that_ is_ cool. Just like this time capsule."

"It'll be totally cool when we dig it up in, like...twenty years..."

"How do you know we'll be together?"

He lay back, bending his elbow and resting his head on his hand. "'Cause we'll be married, and you'll be a mom, and we'll have nine kids..."

"I don't _think_ so...as soon as I get my license, we should just get in a car and drive, like, you know, run away."

"You always want to run away, Katie."

"Yeah," she said. "And you know why."

They looked at each other, and then Kate looked away. She pressed the _stop_ button on the boom box.

He grabbed her baseball cap from her head. "Let's put this in," he said, scrunching the hat into the metal lunch box.

"And your baseball," she said, "signed by Ozzie Smith himself."

"And our friendship bracelets," he said.

"Yeah." They each pulled an orange string bracelet from their wrists.

Kate found a pen and took the paper label out of the plastic cassette case. _Kate and Tom, 1989. _

"Now let's go bury it."

* * *

><p>The acreage stretched out to the sky. Kate carried the lunch box and Tom carried a shovel. There was nothing to see but grass, and one giant maple tree. The summer day was over one hundred, and gnats swarmed close to their skin.<p>

"Twelve paces from the tree," she said. "'Cause we were twelve when we buried it, so that's how we'll remember."

They each took twelve steps, and Tom stuck the shovel into the ground. "Are we gonna put it six feet deep?"

"It's a time capsule, not a dead body," she laughed.

He pried a clump of grass from the ground, and another, and another. "It's too hot to do this."

"Let me have a turn." She laid the heavy lunchbox on the ground.

She dug at the hole while sweat poured down her skin. "It's deep enough."

"Are you sure?"

"Well, I don't want to keep digging."

"Okay," he said, picking up the lunch box. "I'll put it in."

Kate hummed ceremonial music while Tom gently placed the time capsule into the ground.

"So long for twenty years," he said, taking the shovel.

"No, we have to wait longer than that," said Kate. "Like, fifty years."

"Or a hundred."

"Let's just wait until one of us is dying. Then digging it up can be the last thing we ever do together."

"Okay," said Tom. "But by then we'll be too old to dig it up, and we'll have to have our grandkids do it for us."

"Our eighty-one grandkids."

"Hey," he said, smiling. "You never know."

He patted the ground with the shovel.

"Let's always remember this day," she said quietly. "No matter what happens in the future, let's always remember this day."

Tom wrapped his arm around her shoulders. Kate looked out to the horizon. There was no road in sight. She wished Black Pearl was with her, to carry her away...anywhere that was away.

"Isn't it great here?" asked Tom. "Don't you wish we could just stay here forever?"

She pulled away from him. Turning around, she said, "Come on. Let's go home. It's hot."


	3. Age 14

**Ames, Iowa, 1991**

"You got an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other."

Diane smiled as she wet a towel in the kitchen sink. Kate looked down at the strawberry pie stain on her lacey white dress. She rubbed a paper napkin over it.

"No, don't do that," her mother said. "Here."

Diane wiped at the stain with the towel, but it did no good. "Should've got dressed after you ate."

"Sorry, Ma."

"Well, it can't be helped now. You'll just have to change."

She smiled at her daughter.

"You can wear that blue dress of mine. Just hurry up."

Kate left the kitchen and walked down the hall to her mother's bedroom. She slowly pushed open the door. The room was dark, and her stepfather lay unconscious on the bed. She crept slowly across the room. Sliding open the closet door, she looked behind her. Wayne lay on his back. His mouth was open and his eyes were closed. His stomach rose slowly up and down.

She found the baby blue dress in the back of the closet and pulled it off its hanger. She quietly left the room.

In the bathroom, she changed her clothes. She pulled her mother's dress over her head and let it cascade to her knees. She looked into the mirror. She wore no makeup and her hair was dark and wavy. Light from the window highlighted her freckles.

Suddenly, the door crashed open and banged against the wall. Kate gasped. Her stepfather stumbled into the room and slouched against the sink.

"Hey, girl. I thought you was your ma."

She lowered her eyes and saw his hand, filthy with auto grease. She moved for the door and suddenly he grabbed her arm and his breath was in her face.

"Don't you run away from me," he whispered.

She shoved him back with all her strength. He fell back against the sink, and she ran out of the room.

"Hey!" he shouted. "You get back here!"

Kate stomped down the hall as tears came into her eyes.

"What is going on?" Diane said, coming in from the living room.

"I hate him!" Kate shouted. "I hate him!"

"He didn't do anything to you..."

"God!" She clenched her fists. "Just stop defending him!"

"Katherine..." Diane started back down the hall. "We're going to be late for church."

"I'm not going!" she shouted. "I hate you!"

She ran into her bedroom and slammed the door. She pulled off her mother's dress and dropped it onto the bed. Crying and gasping for breath, she found the jeans and sweatshirt she had worn the day before and put them on. A box of Kleenex was on her dresser. She pulled out a handful and sat down on the bed. When she had stopped crying, she put on her socks and running shoes.

"Where do you think you're going?" Diane shouted as Kate rushed through the living room to the front door.

She burst out of the house and ran down the road.

* * *

><p>Tom lived on the other side of town, where the more expensive houses were. She ran across his front yard, up the stairs to the porch, and collided with the screen door. She pounded with her fist.<p>

The door opened. "Katie?"

He stood in the doorway wearing only a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. "What's the matter?"

"I can't stand it!" She sat down on the porch swing and leaned forward. "I can't stand it anymore..."

He came outside and walked to her. "It's okay," he said, sitting next to her. He put his arm around her shoulders. "It's okay."

He held her as she sobbed. Finally, she wiped her hands over her face and breathed hard.

"What did he do?" Tom asked.

"The same things he always does."

She tilted back her head and they looked into each other's eyes. Tom pressed his mouth onto hers, and they kissed. Kate closed her eyes and felt the rest of the world disappear.

"Tom!"

They pulled away from each other. Mrs. Brennan stood in the doorway, simply glaring at Kate. Then she walked away.

Kate jumped up and went to the door. "What is your problem?" she shouted through the screen door. "Why do you look at me like I'm..."

"Katie, don't..." Tom grasped her arm.

"Like I'm some kind of trash! Do you know who my father is? Do you know what he did in Iraq!"

"Katie..."

She cried again. "I can't stand it," she said. "I can't stand it."


	4. Age 16

**Ames, Iowa, 1993**

It was dark and the crickets were loud. Lights from Blue Tail Saloon shone into the parking lot. Kate leaned against the hood of Tom's car with Beth, Chris, Eric, Dawn...they weren't old enough to get in, but listening to the music while sucking on bottles of Coke was fun enough for a Saturday night.

"I'm going riding tomorrow," Kate said. "My dad's coming to pick me up, and we're driving out to the stables."

"Attention, everybody," said Chris. "Kate's bragging about her dad again."

"Oh, I love this song!" shouted Dawn. She and Beth slid down from the car and started dancing.

Tom circled Kate's waist with his arm. He pulled her close. "It's nice to see you in a good mood for a change," he whispered.

She leaned into his shoulder and looked down at the ground. "I'd always be in a good mood if..."

Suddenly, she pulled away. "Do you think they'd let me use the bathroom in there?"

"I dunno."

She walked to a trash can and dropped in her empty soda bottle. At the open doors of the bar, she saw a big guy in a tight T-shirt. Trying to look as innocent as possible, she sauntered to him.

"Is it okay if I just go in to go to the bathroom?"

He looked down at her.

"Come on, I have to pee."

He pointed inside. "Go right inside that door and come right back out."

_Thanks, Brutus,_ she said in her mind, _or whatever your name is. _

She walked inside the wood-panelled bar and was immediately hit with the combined smell of alcohol and cigarettes. The restrooms were to her right. She pushed open the door and was alone in the women's room. After she emptied her bladder, she went to wash her hands in the sink. Only one mirror hung on the wall. It was broken, split down the center. Kate looked into it and saw herself divided in two.

She pushed open the bathroom door and felt it collide into someone. Looking up, she saw a man, young and unshaven.

"Hey, sweetheart. Careful."

He leered down at her. She looked into his face and hated him, a stranger.

"You look like you're fixin' to kill somebody."

She ran past the bouncer and back outside. "I need your keys," she said to Tom in the parking lot.

"What? Katie..."

She reached into his pocket and pulled out his keyring. Pulling open the car door, she jumped inside, and Tom jumped in next to her.

"What are you doing?" he shouted, as she sped out of the parking lot.

The radio was on the same station that had played in the bar. Kate turned up the volume. As far as the headlights shone, there was nothing but road, with a cornfield on each side.

"Katie, slow down," he said, grasping the wheel. "Do you know what my dad's going to do to me if you crash my car?"

She sped around a corner onto a dirt road. Suddenly, she drove into a field of grass and stopped the car.

She leaned forward onto the steering wheel as tears rolled down her face.

"What's the matter?" he asked, pulling the keys from the ignition.

She wiped her hands over her face. "My mom has a black eye," she said. "That's what's the matter."

He sat back in his seat. "Why did she ever marry him?"

"I don't know. I don't know."

She and Tom sat next to each other, not speaking. Then she said, "All I remember is that my dad wasn't there anymore, and then suddenly Wayne was there, sleeping in my mom's bed. I was only like five...and all I remember is them constantly fighting. I don't remember him ever being nice to her. Or to me, either.

"I mean, we're not stupid," she continued. "We don't have a lot of money, but...no one in my mom's family is some ignorant trash like Wayne."

He stroked her hair in his fingertips. "You won't have to live with him forever."

"No, but my mom will. She'll never leave him. She'll stay with him until he kills her."

She started the car and drove back out to the road.


	5. Age 18

**Ames, Iowa, 1995 **

Tom's bedroom window was open, and a breeze blew the curtains. Kate lay in bed beside him, both of their bodies dripping with sweat. All of his things had been packed into boxes.

"Nothing's going to change," he said.

"It will so. It won't ever be the same again and you know it."

"I'll come home every weekend. And as soon as I have enough money, we'll get married."

She rubbed her hand over his chest and tried to picture herself eight years from now, as a doctor's wife. The image couldn't fulfill itself in her mind.

She sat up and found her clothes. "I guess I should go."

"Why?" he asked, pushing himself up on his elbows.

"Your parents are going to want to see you off."

"So? You can be here."

"No, I should..."

She finished dressing and found her tennis shoes. Tom got dressed and followed her out of the room.

"Katie," he said.

She crossed the hall and jogged down the stairs. The front door was open and the screen door was closed. She looked outside and saw Tom's parents arriving. His father drove a U-Haul and his mother drove the car.

She looked out on the scene as if it was a painting, and felt her eyes fill with tears. All she wanted was to leave. Not only to leave Iowa and never come back, but to leave the next place and the next place and the next. But that would be leaving Wayne alone with her mother. And if her mother didn't have anyone to protect her...

Mr. and Mrs. Brennan were standing, talking, in the front yard. Suddenly, Mr. Brennan looked at his house. He saw Kate standing in the doorway, and his expression changed. She decided that she wasn't sad that Tom was going away. She was angry.

Standing behind her, he grasped her arms and turned her around, and she fought against him.

"I'm sorry that I'm not as _good_ as you are," she shouted. "I'm sorry that I'm not as _perfect_ as you!"

"Katie. Katie stop, stop..."

He pulled her close to his body and tried to kiss her. She struggled out of his grasp. He grabbed her arm, and before she knew what she was doing she made a fist and punched him in the chest. He fell back against the stair rail.

"Oh Tom, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."

She ran out of his house, knowing she would never see him again.

She would never be good. She would never have anything good. She jogged up the road to her house and stopped in the front yard. Wayne's truck was parked in the grass, and the hood was propped open. He leaned against the porch rail, opening his first beer of the day. His sister's stepson, Billy Johnson, stood next to him, flipping a Zippo lighter open and closed with one hand. The night before, Kate had heard Wayne tell her mother that Billy had been released from jail.

She crossed the grass. Wayne saw her coming and took a drink.

"Hey, girl." He gestured with his head. "Be careful. Billy's on the loose."

Billy chuckled at Wayne's remark and eyed her up and down. Kate looked at him. His hair was long and his face was unshaved. His shirt was unbuttoned to his waist.

"Come here," she said.

"What?"

"Come here." She grabbed his arm and pulled him with her as she climbed the porch stairs.

Ignoring Wayne's whistles, she led Billy through the house to her room.

"Aren't you making the first move..."

"Don't talk." She pushed him down on the bed. She slammed her door and popped her favorite Aerosmith tape into her boom box. "Don't say anything."

The music pounded around the room. She climbed on top of him.

She pressed herself into his body, leaned forward and kissed him.


	6. Age 20

**Kelley, Iowa, 1997 **

Kate stood back and looked at the table. It was set perfectly, and the food smelled delicious. She heard her father wake up and she adjusted the vase of flowers.

"Good morning, Daddy."

"You made breakfast," he said, walking into the room.

They smiled at each other and sat down to eat.

"Tom Brennan's coming home for the weekend," she said, chewing a bite of fruit salad. "I think I'll go over to see him."

"He's a nice kid," Sam said. "Whatever happened between you two?"

"Nothing happened," Kate said, looking down at her plate. "We just grew apart... He has a girlfriend." She looked up and smiled. "He told me he wants us to meet. He thinks we could be friends."

"Sometimes people grow apart."

She put down her fork. "Is that what happened between you and Mom?"

"No...well, we wanted different things."

"She wanted Wayne, didn't she?" She looked sharply into her father's face.

"Katie..."

"I'm old enough to know."

"It's not that, it's..." He picked up his glass and took a long drink.

"What?"

He swallowed and spoke. "Every time you talk about him, that look comes over you. And that scares me, Katie."

She looked at him, not knowing what to say.

"I saw that look in Iraq, too many times. Most of us hated it. We hated the violence and the killing, even when we knew it was the right thing to do. There've been times when I've found it very difficult to live with the things I did over there. But there were guys I knew that were different."

"What are you saying to me?" she said, grasping the tablecloth.

"They had murder in their hearts, Katie. And the war brought it out of them."

She looked down, astonished, and felt her eyes fill with tears.

"You have your whole life ahead of you. I don't want you to do anything to destroy that."

"Dad...how can you say that to me?"

She stood up from the table. "I'm leaving," she said.

"Katie, don't leave..."

"I'm leaving."

She went to the living room for her things. Framed photos on the wall showed her playing baseball, standing next to Black Pearl and holding his bridle, and fishing in the lake.

"Don't leave," Sam said, walking into the room. "Katie..."

She opened the front door and left the house. Diane's car was parked in the driveway. Kate found her keys, got in and sped away.

* * *

><p>As she neared the Brennans' house, she slowed the car. She looked down the street and saw Tom pull into the driveway. The car doors opened, and he stepped out with his girlfriend. She was tall, dark, and pretty. Mrs. Brennan emerged from the house, and hugged Tom first, then went to Rachel.<p>

Kate put the car in reverse, and backed out the way she had come. Ignoring the speed limit, she drove to Billy Johnson's house.

* * *

><p>"When you were in jail," she asked, "was there anyone there who had killed someone?"<p>

They sat on a threadbare couch. Kate's legs were splayed across Billy's lap, the TV was turned down low, and the light was off. They both drank bottles of beer.

"Yeah, there was someone," Billy said. "Guy named Pete. Someone had stolen his car, and he knew who'd done it, so he just took his shotgun across town and blew the guy's brains out."

"Pete?"

"Yeah, Pete Smith."

"What was he like?"

"Baddest-ass motherfucker you ever met. Not too bright, though. He got caught."

"You got caught," she said, smirking.

"That was Mike's fault," he said. "Just remember, you want your robbin' done right, do it yourself."

Kate thought for a minute. "If you were going to kill somebody, how would you do it?"

"I'll tell you how I'd do it," he said. "Wait till the guy leaves in the morning. Go in the kitchen, open the stove, disable the pilot light, turn on the gas. The minute that bastard walks in his house with a lit cigarette, the whole thing blows up."

Kate thought for a minute. "But if someone saw you at his house..."

"Don't matter. No one can prove that it wasn't just a gas leak."

Billy's lighter lay on the coffee table. Kate picked it up. She flipped it open and closed.

"You ain't thinking of killing anyone, are you?"

She shook her head. "I was just wondering what makes someone do it."


	7. Age 22

**Ames, Iowa, 1999 **

Kate rode her motorcycle into the driveway and parked behind her mother's car. She turned off the motor and the roar of the engine ceased.

Diane opened the screen door and stood on the porch, drying a plate with a dishcloth. "Well, looks like you bought it."

Kate climbed off the motorcycle and knocked the kickstand into place.

"If you're going to ride around on that deathtrap can you at least do me the courtesy of wearing a helmet?"

"Helmets are for wimps, Ma," she said, climbing the porch steps.

* * *

><p>"So I'll be working at that diner now," Diane said as Kate sat down at the kitchen table. "Maybe I could put in a good word for you. We could serve coffe side-by-side."<p>

"I don't think so," she said, smiling.

"Well, then what are you going to do with yourself?"

"I don't know, but I'm not going to work at a diner."

Diane stacked a plate in the cabinet and hung the dishtowel on the wall. "Wouldn't have to be forever."

"That's what you said when you were my age, isn't it?"

Diane sat down at the table.

"And now you're 45, and still working at diners."

"Things don't always turn out the way we want them to, Katherine. That's something you just have to accept."

"No, Ma," she said. "I'm not just going to accept it."

They heard Wayne's truck pull into the driveway. They looked at each other.

When the back door crashed open, Kate stood up from the table.

"Diane!" he shouted, stumbling inside. "Why the hell weren't you home this mornin'?"

"I told you I was going to see about that job."

"Don't you lie to me!" he shouted. The stench of whiskey filled the room. "You tell me where you were!"

"She got that job at the diner, Wayne!" shouted Kate, standing between him and her mother.

"You don't have to yell at him." Diane stood up from the table. Kate turned her head, and in that moment Wayne was across the room, knocking Diane to the floor.

"You tell me where you were!" he shouted. "Tell me where you were!"

"Stop it!" Kate grabbed his arm and pulled him up, hating to touch him, hating the smell of him. "Stop!"

Diane stood up, took a step, and Wayne wrenched his arm out of Kate's grasp. He made a fist and rammed it into Diane's jaw. Her head snapped back and hit the doorframe, and she slid to the floor.

Kate didn't remember picking up the knife but it was suddenly in her hand. She held it before his face, crying and spitting as she talked. "Stop it! Stop!"

"Don't hurt him!" Diane shouted. "Katherine, don't hurt him!"

Wayne knocked her out of the way, and as Diane stood up, grabbed his wife by the hair. Diane moaned, Wayne shook her head back and forth, and as she tried to escape his grasp, he pulled the other way. Diane screamed again as a fistful of blonde hair came out in his fingertips.

"Oh my God, you just pulled her hair out!" Kate screamed, as her mother cried.

"Stupid bitches!" he shouted. He crossed the room and left the house, slamming the back door.

Kate kneeled down as Diane cried. "My hair, my hair..."

"Mom..." Kate was crying and gasping for breath.

"I blacked out," Diane said. "I blacked out for a second."

"That means you have a concussion." She helped her into a standing position and then into a chair. "You have to go to the hospital."

"No, I'm all right, I'm all right..."

"Mom, you blacked out."

"What would I tell them happened?"

"Tell them your husband beat the hell out of you!"

She leaned forward and rested her head in her hands. "No, they wouldn't understand, Katherine. He just didn't know what he was doing..."

Kate walked a few steps backwards and leaned against the wall to cry. This was really her mother, and this was really her life. She closed her eyes, but that didn't make it go away. Nothing would ever make it go away.


	8. Age 24

**Ames, Iowa, 2001**

Kate opened the mailbox and pulled out a fat bent envelope. She tore it open on her way up the stairs. At the door to her apartment, she juggled her grocery bags and the envelope and her key ring. She let herself in and set her things on the table.

"I got those pictures of my dad," she told Billy. He lay on the couch, and the TV was on. Kate sat down by his feet and poured the contents of the envelope onto the coffee table. "I'm going to make a scrapbook for his birthday."

"How old is he gonna be?"

"Half-a-century old."

"Wow."

She picked up a handful of black-and-white photos and saw a formal portrait of her father in uniform, standing in front of a tank in Korea, and holding the leash of a German shepherd he had trained. Smiling, she flipped the picture over and saw that it had been taken with a camera that printed the date on the back. She read the numbers.

_08-15-76._

"That's weird."

"What's weird?"

She flipped over another picture_. 01-30-77_. The next one read: _12-3-76_. And the next one: _06-13-76._

"He couldn't have been in Korea when...my mom would have got pregnant in August..."

Billy sat up and looked at the backs of the pictures. "Maybe your mom went with him."

"No, she couldn't have. She always talked about how much she missed him when he was away, how lonely she was..."

"Well, maybe she was just too lonely, then." He laughed.

"What do you mean?"

"If Sam was in Korea when you were conceived, and your mom was in Iowa..." He lay back on the couch.

* * *

><p>She sped down the road and into the driveway. She leaped off her motorcycle and ran into the house.<p>

Diane was in the living room, vacuuming the rug. Kate yanked the cord out of the wall.

"Katherine, what is wrong?"

"When was Daddy in Korea?" she shouted. "You got pregnant with me in August, so when was Daddy in Korea and when was he home?"

Her mother looked at her but didn't move. Kate noticed that her left wrist was wrapped in a bandage.

"Oh, I can't...can't remember," Diane said, sitting down.

"Don't say you can't remember! Tell me what's going on!"

"He was away for so long, Katherine. I was by myself, living in a run-down apartment..."

"So you cheated on him? With who?"

"Katherine, I didn't ever want to tell you about this. I didn't want you to ever know."

Kate ran her fingertips over her forehead and her cheekbones, the parts of her face that she had always thought resembled her father. "Tell me!" she shouted.

Diane spoke calmly, looking straight ahead.

"Sam was away," she said. "And I was alone, doing factory work. I was so lonely, so depressed. One night I just took myself out to a bar, and that's where I met Wayne."

Kate stepped back, towards the door. "What?"

"I began a relationship with him, and I got pregnant. I wrote to Sam and told him what had happened, and how much I regretted it. He forgave me, and when he came home, we decided to make our marriage work. He wanted to be a father to you, and we decided to never tell you the truth."

"No, it's not him. It's not Wayne..."

"Then we started not getting along. And I ran into Wayne again. I decided to divorce Sam and marry Wayne."

Kate felt her whole life disappear. What her name should be, her real name, forced its way into her head. She tried not to let it, but there it was: _Katherine Anne Janssen_.

"Wayne's not my father..."

"Yes, Katherine. He is."

* * *

><p>"Just get out of here!" she shouted. "Get the fuck out of here!"<p>

"What?" Billy sat up on the couch.

"This is _my_ apartment…you don't pay the bills! Get the hell away from me!"

She pulled him up, clawing his arms with her nails. She beat her fists against his back until he was on the other side of the door. She slammed it and locked it.

She stood in the living room and cried as Billy pounded on the door. Then, running into the bedroom, she pulled open the closet and yanked out his clothes. His wallet was on the dresser. She carried everything she could to the front door. Pulling it open, she saw him standing in the hall. She threw his things at him and slammed the door.

* * *

><p>The computer room at the library was empty, except for her. The windows showed a dark sky. Kate looked at the screen. Her mother's social security number and other information were scribbled on a scrap of paper.<p>

She had typed all the necessary information and the website told her that papers would be sent to her mailing address. She sat back happily, relieved that it could be done, that she could take out a home insurance policy in her mother's name.

She looked at her watch. The library closed in half-an-hour. She opened a new page. It was weird, she thought. When she was twelve and she'd wanted to know everything about horses, she'd come to this same library and checked out every book she could find on the subject. When she was twenty and had wanted to learn about motorcycles, she'd done the same thing. And now she wanted to know about murder.

She typed: _what happens to body fire_ and hit the enter key. Scrolling down, she found lists of executives who had lost their jobs. "That's not what I want," she said to herself. She clicked the screen and typed: _what happens when body burns. _

She opened a webpage. The pictures she saw were gruesome photos of death scenes. A burned house and a charred body in a bed. A blackened skull of a woman whose flesh, hair, and eyes had melted away. She clicked the back button and found a different site.

When a body burns, she found out, the muscles become dry. This forces them to contract, which moves the arms and legs into strange positions. Burned bodies are often found with arms and fists jutted out, as if the person died trying to defend himself.

She clicked the search bar again and typed: _unsolved murders._ Lists and lists of millions of deaths over the centuries were before her eyes. It almost seemed like more people got away with it than didn't. She clicked on _images_, and saw O.J. Simpson's mug shot and a picture of JonBenet Ramsey. Scrolling down, she saw pictures of bodies, naked and dead, lain on autopsy tables.

"Ma'am?"

She suddenly looked up. A librarian stood in the doorway. "We close in five minutes," she said.

Kate looked around and breathed hard, remembering that she was in the library. "All right. Thanks."

She clicked the _x_ at the top of the screen and left.

* * *

><p>She sat in her old bedroom, packing just a few things she couldn't stand to lose. Photo albums were piled on the dresser, and her Mom's wedding ring – from her first marriage – was in Kate's pocket. She opened a drawer and saw stacks of <em>Seventeen<em> and a few cassette tapes. All through high school, Aerosmith had been her favorite band, and she had lain in her room listening to "Janie's Got a Gun" until she was sick of it. At the time, she often fantasized about killing Wayne. But there had always been something in her mind that told her she would never really do it. It was weird how things had changed.

She pulled her motorcycle into the back parking lot of the car shop, hopped off and jogged in through the back door. "Where's Steve?" she asked the receptionist. Mary pointed to his office.

"I just came to tell you that I won't be coming back," she said, walking in. "And I need my paycheck now."

"Kate, you've only been here three months," he said.

"Yeah, well, I need to move on. My paycheck?"

"You'll get it next week – "

"No, I need it now."

"You want to tell me why?"

"Steve, please."

"All right," he said. He reached into a drawer and pulled out some paperwork. She looked at the clock on the wall, checked her watched, and looked back at the clock.

"Don't expect a good reference," he said as he wrote the check.

He handed it to her and she jogged through the shop and out the back door. In the parking lot, she saw that it wasn't as much as he owed her, but it was as much as she would need.

* * *

><p>Her mom was working. Wayne was out, getting drunk. Kate parked her motorcycle. She wondered if the fire would spread to the trees in the yard, or to the barn. She went inside.<p>

In the kitchen, she stood in front of the stove. She took the burners off and laid them on the table, then lifted the sheet of metal on top of the stove. The two pilot lights burned steadily. With a wrench, she turned them off. She replaced the metal cover and the burners, then turned all the knobs to full strength and smelled the unlit gas.

She went to the barn and found a roll of twine. Unraveling it, she walked back to the house. She pulled open the back door and set what was left of the roll on the floor. She held the string and closed the door on top of it. She pulled the string as she walked away from the house, about fifty feet. Then she set it on the ground.

She walked back around the house. She sat down on the porch, and pulled a lighter out of her pocket. She flipped it open and closed as she waited for her father to come home.


End file.
